When flushing outboard do you use additives .........

[grinner2]

Had my 115 4 stroke Suzuki serviced last week ( only has 44 hrs on the clock ) Service guy questioned me whether I was flushing motor after every use ( My answer, yes ....... religiously , I run it for 10 minutes or so with fresh water whilst I am tidying up the insides of the boat )
He advised me that there was a large amount of salt built up internally & that he replaced 1 of the internal anodes ( which he kept to show me )
He could not fault my flushing process & iam left a little confused / concerned why this would be the case .
Can anyone out there suggest any thing .
I have never used additives when flushing this motor or previous motors & never had any issues until now . What are your thoughts on additives ( Macs / Salt away, are they worth running )

[wayno60]

just water......

[myusernam]

the local guy in townsville that used to sell suzuki used to push the saltaway in a big way, and I have heard other reports about anodes and corrosion in suzukis. also they are meant to have the lowest copper content in their alloy so not the best for corrosion.
Maybe it's more prudent with suzukis.
No outboards are perfect but it's generally accepted that the jap engines aren't as good as the US ones when it comes to corrosion resistance

[bonneville]

temperature along with water for that 10 minutes should clean out most salt build ups, but u do need to make sure the engine warms up so the thermostat opens up.
I remember vividly back home, probably in the late 70's, I used to help my uncle at his workshop. He was an out board mechanic. he had his tub with the engine legs in it to start the motors up. I remember him pouring a cup of dish washing liquid into the tub ! I asked him why, he said water and the engine temperature can only do so much, this stuff will loosen all the build ups of salt and leave a bit of residue in there for the next start up and use, if consistently used, not to much mind, but from then on it was for me, standard practice. I always got the job of draining the tank, refilling it with fresh water and adding the new detergent. The sediment after 1 week of use, from supposed always flushe engine was quite astonishing ! now days on the ear muff's, i'll squirt a bit down the hose reconnect the ear muffs and flush away, again, not much needed. So who knows really, myth or fact, just something old school that I've always done.
but I do remember scraping the sludge off the bottom of the tank before re filling, and these motors were only in for service and had been flushed on there last use.......
Bonneville
ps, I will note he had the tell tale water going back into the tank, hence the build up and regular weekly change.

[wayno60]

Good tip bonneville.

[scottar]

I use Armour All wash and wax. I noticed the difference with a previous tinny that I owned. When I washed with just water, in wet weather the boat would feel wet as the residual salt sucked the moisture out of the air. Washed with the car wash it didn't happen. For the motor I use a salt away injector but run the car wash instead.

[Bonus]

I do my own servicing of my DF175 Suzuki 4 stroke. It is quite normal for the anodes in the block on these engines to attract a salty gelly and it is normal for the anodes to corrode away. This is the anode doing its job and attracting corrosion. There are 5 anodes in the block in my engine. I was taught by the Suzuki specialist in Brisbane and I build auto racing engines as a hobby, so I am not guessing with the info I give. I clean up or replace these anodes with every service.
Recently I have started using saltaway in both my outboards and upon servicing the DF175 I have noticed the inside of the block appears a little cleaner, although the anodes still have lots of salty gel on them and are still doing their job.
From what I have seen so far I will continue to use saltaway. I am a little concerned with members using detergent as detergent contains caustic soda and if you place alloy in caustic soda it is very quickly destroyed. Detergent is a very mild caustic solution but still I would flush the detergent out at least. In fact I would not use it.

[Bonus]

Grinner2, what process are you using to flush your engine as they are a bugger to flush.

[Seahorse]

On my yammy 4 stroke i have been told by 2 dealers, just unscrew hose on side of motor and plug water hose in and turn hose on. No starting motor.

greg

[Axl]

On my yammy 4 stroke i have been told by 2 dealers, just unscrew hose on side of motor and plug water hose in and turn hose on. No starting motor.

greg

You wont be flushing your motor properly by doing this, there is plenty of info on this site around this subject. Do yourself a favour and do a search of the site.

[grinner2]

I attach the muffs ( with the leg in the down position ) Turn tap on full bore , start engine & allow to idle for 10 min or so whilst I clean the internals of the boat out .
Once complete , turn the motor off turn the tap off remove muffs & store until next time .

[grinner2]

Sea horse , I mentioned to the mechanic about flushing with the motor not running ( using the upper hose connection ) he advised against it & said to continue using the muffs with engine running , as this does a more thorough job.

[Moonlighter]

My mechanic found the same thing last service on my DF115. Anodes almost gone.

He Recommended:

1. Flush for longer on the muffs so thermostats open and salt gets washed away - at least 10-15 mins
2. After that, plug hose to flush connector and flush another 10 mins without engine running.

He did mention that he has one client who uses warm water to flush and his anodes and block is sparkly clean. Warm water takes more salt away, obviously.

i do notice when I wash my alloy boat down that if I use car wash, it takes the salt off far, far better than if I just wash with fresh water. If no car wash is used, a week later the boat sides will have salt on it when its sitting in the shed. I normally use one of those windex bottles where it sucks the car wash out into the spray and you can turn it on or off as required.

Makes me wonder how a brief shot of car wash would work in the hose for the engine flush? Is it caustic like detergent?

[bonneville]

I do my own servicing of my DF175 Suzuki 4 stroke. It is quite normal for the anodes in the block on these engines to attract a salty gelly and it is normal for the anodes to corrode away. This is the anode doing its job and attracting corrosion. There are 5 anodes in the block in my engine. I was taught by the Suzuki specialist in Brisbane and I build auto racing engines as a hobby, so I am not guessing with the info I give. I clean up or replace these anodes with every service.
Recently I have started using saltaway in both my outboards and upon servicing the DF175 I have noticed the inside of the block appears a little cleaner, although the anodes still have lots of salty gel on them and are still doing their job.
From what I have seen so far I will continue to use saltaway. I am a little concerned with members using detergent as detergent contains caustic soda and if you place alloy in caustic soda it is very quickly destroyed. Detergent is a very mild caustic solution but still I would flush the detergent out at least. In fact I would not use it.
sorry to be argumentative, but please name the "mild caustic solution" that dish washing liquid has in it ????
I wash my car with the stuff !!
dish washing liquid is an alkaline, not acidic ! commercial grade detergents have a caustic base, but you seriously wouldn't think anyone would be stupid enough to use that ???????
as mentioned, saltaway is a great product, by why spend money when you already have it under your kitchen sink.........
....maybe I didn't explain myself properly in my post, i'll check and edit it to say " dish washing liquid"
regards
Bonneville
nope, just checked, " dish washing liquid" detergent was not mentioned...............

[bigjimg]

I only ever use water but I add a stubby to my hand while I wait for the temp to come up to spec. Usually takes around 10 min to complete and another stubby. Jim

[Bonus]

Caustic soda is an ingredient of all soap, detergent and car wash. It is actually NaOH which is a strong alkaline. It is not an acid at all. I am not sure of the ingredients in saltaway as they don't say on the bottle. I personally would rather use something that is designed for the job as it is made to not react with the alloys of outboards and boats.
Grinner2, I used to use muffs but had trouble getting my 175 to prime as there are other holes that have to be blocked off behind the pickup area. I now use a drum with the saltaway in it. The thermostat does need to be open to clean the engine properly. The 175 also has 2 plugs, one on the leg and one at the engine front. I always open these momentarily(5 seconds) while flushing as they can hold salt water which does not get flushed out. The front one especially is connected to a long pipe which is attached to the bottom of the block. It holds salt water which can go back into the engine after flushing. I always flush the engine while the oil is still hot and this helps to open the thermostat faster.
A 115 Suzuki may be different.
There is nothing wrong with plain old water and a stubby in the hand lol

[Dignity]

Bonneville, I think from memory that caustic solutions were all Alkali's, but the amount in dishwashing detergent is probably so small it would not do any harm otherwise I would imaging that the millions of people that wash their aluminium pots and pans would be replacing them far more often than they do.

[bonneville]

Bonneville, I think from memory that caustic solutions were all Alkali's, but the amount in dishwashing detergent is probably so small it would not do any harm otherwise I would imaging that the millions of people that wash their aluminium pots and pans would be replacing them far more often than they do.
I think your right there. the whole point is that dish washing liquid, is so mild, it wouldn't do an ounce of damage inside the water galleries. and truth be known, doing the same job salt away is doing. the object is to break down any salt build up, or, don't bother and just use water. a warm engine helps as well. as mentioned, saltaway is a good product !! i'll stick with my less expensive method, more money for fishing tid bits LOL, does anyone no what the make up of saltaway is ??? im picking a squirt of dish washing liquid will do the same thing, save you some money, and put those fancy marketing executives out of a job LOL
but, hey, I could be wrong too, but if you saw the inside of my out board leg, clean as a babies @@@@
regards
bonneville

[fishychrissy]

I got told the same thing as you Greg about flushing my F60 Yamaha when I picked my new boat up from a Yamaha dealer.
Why didn't they tell me to use the muffs too?
They expressly said don't use muffs, just use the top flushing connection?
Makes me a bit shitty after spending about $9000 on the donk alone. Is it just poor communication or lack of knowledge on their behalf?
Cheers
Chris

[cwcarter]

Quick search and looks like salt away is just a detergent with corrosion inhibitors.

ingredients-
Corrosion Inhibitors
Key acid Fast Blue RB Dye
TSP Crystal
water distilled






Trisodium phosphate is also known as TSP and is an agent that is primarily used for cleaning. It is also an additive in food and a stain remover. The look of this agent is white and it is made from solid crystals. They dissolve in water and create a solution that is alkaline in nature. It can also be found in white powder form in some cases. It was regularly used in soaps and detergents in the past and is very popular.

[bonneville]

Quick search and looks like salt away is just a detergent with corrosion inhibitors.

ingredients-
Corrosion Inhibitors
Key acid Fast Blue RB Dye
TSP Crystal
water distilled






Trisodium phosphate is also known as TSP and is an agent that is primarily used for cleaning. It is also an additive in food and a stain remover. The look of this agent is white and it is made from solid crystals. They dissolve in water and create a solution that is alkaline in nature. It can also be found in white powder form in some cases. It was regularly used in soaps and detergents in the past and is very popular.



cheers for the info cwcarter
just goes to show ya, you can re-lable something as much as you want, but an apple is an apple, even when you package it up and market the hell out of it as a new discovery ! guess my uncle was a trend setter
Palmolive's my weapon of choice, "your hands are soaking in it "
save ya self some hard earned and flog some from under the kitchen sink !

bonneville

[Moonlighter]

Interesting discussion.

Just did some googling about corrosion inhibitors too, and found the following advice for cooling system maintenance on cars, including those with alloy engines:

Flush the system if the system appears contaminated or if scale build-up is suspected. It is good practice to always flush a cooling system with a quality alkaline based flushing product when replacing the coolant, and use clean, soft or demineralised water when refilling.

And this:

In general, all corrosion inhibitors work better when blended in glycol as it provides better stability for the corrosion inhibitor chemicals.

So it is pretty clear that flushing your 4s outboard with an alkaline solution wont hurt it and will help remove scale (corrosion and related deposits) from the engine water galleries. And throw a touch of some corrosion inhibiting chemicals in as well wouldn't hurt either. Such as one of the commonly available glycol type concentrated treatments from any auto store.

Might be tempted to make up my own outboard flushing brew! A shot of palmolive plus a touch of glycol inhibitor, and bingo, best of both.

[bonneville]

good post moonlighter, didn't know about the glycol !!
if it has a house hold use, even better, i'll put it on her indoors shopping list ! LOL
took a mate out fishing a while back, and while at the jetty, idling up and getting ready to untie and head out, mate commented, whats that smell ? I replied, its just two stroke fumes, they'll go in a minute, him not being a boaty, said, ahh, two stroke fume's ! gee, smells like soap !
didn't think to much of it, but realised her indoors had swapped brands to some scented dish washing liquid LOL I promptly informed her it just wouldn't do and to shop somewhere else till she could find my Palmolive !!!! must have over done it on the previous flush......

bonneville

[Bonus]

Be careful with glycol, it is deadly poisionous. lol. A friend of mine uses a cap full of soluable oil in his drum to flush his outboard. The outboard is 20 years old and still going strong. Just another idea for the adventurous. You will also notice that saltaway has corrosion inhibitors as part of its contents. Palmolive detergent does not. The good thing about having 5 anodes in the block is that when servicing the outboard I can see inside the block when they are removed. I will let you all know what I think about saltaway after using it for a couple of years.